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Where The West Was Won

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Shortly after 8:00 A.M. a Galveston volunteer saw a cloud of dust on the road from Harrisburg, and soon thereafter Cos arrived to reinforce Santa Anna to twelve hundred or more. Houston watched them march into Santa Anna's camps, and when the Texian who alerted him to Cos's coming expressed chagrin that delay had allowed the enemy to be reinforced, the general only responded that his men were tired and needed food and rest. Another twenty-four hours would see them in shape to fight, meaning Houston had no intention of acting this day. He did send out a reconnaissance to glean a better picture of Mexican numbers, and while he awaited the result the frustration in camp grew. "Our men were becoming very much disheartened for fear we would not be permitted to attack them until they [were] reinforced so strong that we could not whip them," one Texian recalled. By noon there was still no action, and in exasperation several officers finally demanded that Houston meet with them. In a heated discussion no immediate decision resulted. Some afterward claimed that the general expressed an intent to continue the retreat now that Santa Anna was reinforced. Others maintained that Houston had decided to attack. Whichever was the case, by three o'clock some kind of resolve emerged, though whether Houston made it freely or was forced to it remains a mystery. He sent a small party of men to burn a nearby bridge to isolate Santa Anna from yet more reinforcements believed to be on the road.

Finally, just after 3:00 P.M., Houston gave the order they all wanted, though Thomas Rusk seems to have given the same order independently. Seguin was there with a small company of tejano cavalry. He had continued his role in the Runaway Scrape until Houston sent him to watch Ramirez y Sesma's cavalry.

The men formed into their companies, then both Rusk and Houston made speeches. Meanwhile, in the lines the men recalled Houston's recent exhortation, and they whispered to each other "Remember Crockett" and "Recollect Fannin," while others responded "Aye, and Bowie and the Alamo." Houston put Burleson's First Texan Volunteers in the center with the Twin Sisters. The Second Texan Volunteers commanded by Colonel Sidney Sherman took position on Burleson's left, and several other companies of infantry formed the artillery's right. Houston gave command of the sixty-one cavalrymen to Mirabeau Lamar in recognition of his daring behavior in the skirmish the day before and placed them on the far right.

Houston sent them forward, hoping to cover several hundred yards to a rise that concealed them from Mexican view without giving away their movement. At the same time he got word that the bridge had been successfully destroyed, meaning that now the Texians themselves could not use it if forced to retreat. Irrevocably they were committed to what would almost certainly have to be the last battle of the revolt. It was a fortuitous moment. Santa Anna's men felt exhausted from their march of the previous day, not to mention being up much of the night erecting earthwork defenses. They spent most of this day so far on watch for an imminent attack, but by about 4:00 P.M. Santa Anna concluded, not unreasonably, that Houston was not going to make any move today, as indeed he had not intended to until forced by his officers. Consequently, the general gave orders that the men could relax their guard and get some much-needed rest. Santa Anna himself retired to a headquarters tent quickly erected behind his lines. What mattered most in the instant, however, is that the Mexican army was not ready for what was coming.

At 4:30 Texian cannon awakened them rudely with several rounds of grapeshot, scatter-loads. Then Lamar led his cavalry toward the left of Santa Anna's line in a charge designed to distract Mexican attention from the advancing infantry, while the infantry itself rushed forward, its musicians mischievously playing a popular song whose refrain asked "will you come to the bower I have shaded for you," though some thought it was actually "The Girl I Left Behind Me." Houston himself moved with them on his horse, in spite of desultory Mexican musket and artillery fire that mostly went harmlessly overhead, and when he got within about forty yards of the Mexican line, he halted the men, calmly directed them to straighten their lines, and then ordered the first volley. "Then each man took cool and steady aim, and seven hundred rifles and muskets rent the welkin," recalled a witness. "It was our first and last volley." Houston hoped to keep his men in line and send in more volleys, but the men were not about to be held back now that the long-awaited moment lay at hand. It did not help that Rusk, perhaps unwilling to risk one more hesitation from the general, took matters in his own hands, as he had earlier that day, and rode along the line yelling to the men, "If we stop, we are cut to pieces! Don't stop - go ahead - give them Hell!"

Despite Houston's imprecations, his own lines immediately disintegrated as the men rushed forward and poured over the enemy breastworks and into the camps of the startled Mexicans, who had been in some degree paralyzed by that first volley. Santa Anna himself had been asleep and the fire awakened him abruptly. The first thing to meet his eyes when he emerged from his tent was his own men already in some state of disorder. "The mischief was already done," he confessed later. He tried to shift units to stop the disintegration, but it proved too late. One of his own best generals, Manuel Fernandez Castrillon, fell with a mortal wound, and then recent conscripts broke ranks and inadvertently prevented experienced regulars from using their arms. Then he and the others heard Texian voices yelling words perhaps not understood, but whose meaning was soon all too clear. "Remember the Alamo, Goliad, and Tampico!" they yelled. "In a second we were into them," recalled Walter P. Lane, "with guns, pistols and bowie knives."

It was almost nothing like a battle, but rather a host of isolated personal fights that lasted just eighteen minutes. Seguin recalled that "the entire enemy line, panic struck, took to flight," and Lane gleefully likened the Mexicans' retreat to "running like turkeys." The one Mexican field piece was soon captured while still loaded, and virtually all of Santa Anna's camp equipment, baggage, even flags, fell into the hands of ecstatic Texians. Most of the Mexicans simply fled, while others who tried to make a stand were overwhelmed in a combat that became hand-to-hand. "We, having no bayonets, used the butt-ends of our muskets and rifles like the war-clubs of the Indians," recalled one volunteer, "many paying for it by having their shooting-irons break off at the breech." All too quickly it became apparent that their rallying cries of "Remember the Alamo" and "Remember Goliad" were as much calls for vengeance, for now many Mexicans died in the same manner as the Texians in those massacres. Enraged Texians shot and bayonetted scores as they threw down their arms and tried to surrender, begging for mercy. Houston and other officers attempted to stop the slaughter, but to no avail. This was the soldiers' battle, and they had scores to settle. By the time they finished, six hundred fifty of Santa Anna's men lay dead, most of them paying with their lives for their commander's policy of no quarter elsewhere. Another seven hundred thirty were prisoners or would be within a few days when Houston sent his cavalry in pursuit, but by then the fury had subsided and the captured soldados had little more to fear in the way of reprisals. The Texians lost just nine killed or dying, and another thirty wounded, one of them Houston himself, with a shattered ankle.

Amid the cleaning up after the killing and looting was done, it became quickly apparent that Santa Anna himself had escaped. With all around him in chaos and the Texians close to taking him, he had accepted the offer of a servant's horse and galloped away toward Filisola's last known position, actually riding through the closing Texians. He got as far as the burned bridge, pursued by Texian horsemen, and when he saw he could not cross, he quickly hid himself in a thicket and escaped detection until nightfall. Then he waded the Buffalo Bayou and continued on foot, coming on an abandoned house in which he found clothing to disguise himself. The next morning he was walking out in the open when three Texian cavalrymen surprised him and he had no choice but to give himself up, though still not revealing his identity.

When the horsemen returned to Houston's camp with their prisoner, none of the Texians knew the man by sight. They were just putting him in a temporary "bull pen" made of ropes tied to pack saddles, when some of the soldados recognized their general. "Santa Anna, Presidenta Heneral!" they began shouting, which quickly alerted the Texians to the true identity of their prize. "None of us knew it was Santa Anna or we'd [have] shot him right there," recalled one Texian who missed the battle but came into camp shortly afterward. Officers immediately had to to quell the desire of many to wreak vengeance for the Alamo and Goliad. At once they took him to Houston, then lying on a blanket beneath the shade of an oak tree, and in considerable pain from his wound. A Texian standing nearby talking with Lamar saw Santa Anna, spattered with mud and clearly nervous, squeeze Houston's hand to awaken him and then introduce himself. Houston motioned to a medicine chest nearby and asked him to be seated, saying with sarcasm that "such accommodation as we have is at your service." Once seated, the Mexican general asked for some of the opiate laudanum being used to treat Houston's pain in order to settle his own nerves.

Calmed, Santa Anna assumed a characteristic bravado. "You have conquered the Napoleon of the West," he said boastfully. "You have whipped me, I am your prisoner," he told the victor, "but Filisola is not whipped. He will not surrender as a prisoner of war. You must whip him first." Houston immediately charged him with the outrages at the Alamo and Goliad. Santa Anna pleaded that he actually had orders from his government to take no insurgent prisoners, trying to sidestep the fact that he was himself the real government in Mexico. But this was only initial sparring. The two soon got to the essential business before them. Neither was a fool. Whatever he might say later, Houston had to know that he did not defeat the Mexican army. Through his own luck, Santa Anna's complacence, and the Texian volunteers' impetuosity, he had simply defeated Santa Anna. He knew, and Santa Anna knew that Houston knew, that Mexico still had more than four thousand soldados in Texas, with substantial commands in hand on the road under Generals Filisola, Urrea, Antonio Gaona, and others. Mexico still had ample military force present to continue the war with much expectation of ultimate success, especially under better subordinates than the generalissimo himself, whereas Texian forces were widely scattered in small bands, and the only army under Houston was no match in numbers for Urrea and the rest.

Still, the Mexican commander well knew that hundreds of Texians out in Houston's camps wanted his blood to atone for the Alamo and Goliad. Alone and helpless, he had nothing to bargain with but his wits if he was to save his life. He could promise anything now, knowing that he could always come back for Texas another time if he chose. His boast about Filisola was a hollow declaration, for Santa Anna had a "but" to follow, believing that he could save his own life even at the cost of humiliation for his men and officers. "If I give him orders to leave the limits of Texas," Santa Anna said of Filisola, "he will do it." Houston took the bait, knowing that one lucky victory over Santa Anna's napping soldiers would not likely be repeated with Filisola and Urrea. Accepting the generalissimo's bargain, Houston had him send orders for Filisola and the rest of the Mexican forces to withdraw as far as San Antonio, where they would later be told what to do next. Then they agreed to an armistice until peace terms could be negotiated, though Santa Anna may not as yet have agreed to independence.

With no more to say to his prisoner, Houston ordered Santa Anna kept under guard in his own tent to protect his life from vengeful Texians, some of whom were already shouting that the Mexican commander should be turned over to them for swift justice. Houston explained to the men that Santa Anna was worth far more to them alive than dead, for Santa Anna would almost certainly be amenable to anything to save his own life and could be compelled to use his influence to get the official government in Mexico City to acknowledge Texian independence. The dictator spent a very uncomfortable night on Houston's cot, fearful of sleep, and perhaps just as afraid of what the morrow might bring him. Before he went to bed he wrote a rather understated order to Filisola. Referring to the battle of San Jacinto by saying that he had "yesterday evening had an unfortunate encounter," the general adopted an even more hollow turn of phrase when he told Filisola that "I have resolved to remain as prisoner of war in the hands of the enemy." He ordered Filisola to march his own and Gaona's commands back to Bexar and there await further orders, while Urrea was to march to Victoria. The next day Houston and Santa Anna signed a formal convention for an armistice.

San Jacinto had been one of the most one-sided victories in history, virtually an echo of Jackson's surprising and equally one-sided triumph at New Orleans in 1815. Yet one dramatic difference remained. Jackson got his victory after the war with the British had already been concluded, though he did not yet know the fact. Houston's victory, however, ended only one branch of Santa Anna's campaign.

For Mexico, the defeat was the beginning of a downhill martial and political spiral that would result into the loss of nearly a million square miles in territory. For the Texans, their victory led to annexation into the United States and the United States' war with Mexico. In the end, the United States would gain not only Texas but also New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, Utah and parts of Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming. As a result of the Battle of San Jacinto, almost a third of what is now the United States of America changed ownership.

William C. Davis. . Free Press. 2004. H.W. Brands. . Doubleday. 2004. James L. Haley. . Free Press. 2006.

Sea of Mud: The Retreat of the Mexican Army After San Jacinto A remarkably complete account of what happened to the main force of the Mexican army between April 21 and the second week of May, 1836 . . . a few days [within which] an orderly Mexican withdrawal to a defensive position within Texas turned into an unmitigated disaster which sealed the fate of the Mexican campaign.

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